Why Our Real Estate Newsletter Isn’t All That Pretty

I see a lot of real estate newsletters, because I’m always trying to improve our Fast Newsletters product–the content, the look, and the ease of customization. I want to provide the best client newsletter for real estate agents, at the best price. Period!

I have heard objections that the Fast Newsletter doesn’t have a high-end design or slick corporate look, like something you might see from an advertising and marketing firm, complete with diverse font faces, overlapping images, shadow boxes, offset imagery, print bleeds, etc.

That’s true. Here at Fast Newsletters we do not use high-concept marketing design. And that is by choice, for the following good reasons.

3 Reasons We Will NEVER Look Like a Marketing Piece

1. Fast Newsletters are designed to be customized by real estate agents.
    
   Most real estate agents own the program Microsoft Word, and do not own complex layout software, like InDesign. Even if they own Microsoft Publisher, many do not use it. So MS Word is the lingua franca of the layout world. Most everyone can use it.
    
   Unfortunately, Word has limited layout capabilities–already stretched to nearly the breaking point in our template. So the look of the newsletter is pretty good for the program’s capabilities, without adding serious complexity.”Pretty Good” Is OK, because of Reasons 2 and 3.
2. We like a newsletter that looks and feels personal.

   

   And we don’t like a newsletter that looks and feels like you bought it off a shelf, stuck your name on the cover, and called it good. We believe your newsletter should look like you made it yourself. It should scream that you care enough to be personal. You started a relationship with these people–don’t kill it with an institutional-looking newsletter.

3. Finally, research shows us that a home-made looking real estate newsletter will get read more often than a newsletter that looks like a corporate advertising piece. Think of the difference between a hand-addressed letter in the mail and one with a bulk mail label. Which are you more inclined to open?

When the newsletter looks like it comes from you and the content is meaningful, then people keep reading. A newsletter should EXTEND your relationship, not just remind people of your name. Fast Newsletters adds content that’s a little different than the typical newsletter–a little more emotional and thought-provoking. The content and the design have a heart, just like you.

And that’s why we don’t do high-concept layouts.